Guilty Gear X is the sequel to the original Guilty Gear
fighting game on the Playstation. This sequel first appeared on
the Dreamcast in Japan. It was suppose to get a North American
Dreamcast release, but shortly after the Japanese release, Sega
announced that theyre abandoning the Dreamcast and becoming
a third party publisher. So Sammy did the smart thing and moved
development of the game over to the Playstation 2. Guilty Gear X
is suppose to have a much different style to other 2D fighting
games like Street Fighter, and King of Fighters. So lets
see if system change paid off.

The Story

This is set in 22nd century, and the story follows shortly
after the first Guilty Gear game. In the first game, robots
called Gears developed actual feelings, and rebelled
against the human race. But after everything was all said and
done, they came up on the losing end. All the existing gears were
erased of their memories. But a new and much more powerful Gear
has been discovered. And news has erupted of rival nations using
their own Gears to go to war with each other. So now a band of
characters has gathered together to take on the newly discovered
Gear.

Graphics

This is a 2D fighter, so dont expect the beautiful
computer animated models that you see in games like Tekken Tag
Tournament, or Dead or Alive 2: Hardcore. But the back of the box
says, The most advanced 2D graphics on the Playstation 2
computer entertainment system. And the game does live up to
its own statement. The character models are some of the most
inspired that have graced my eyes. Especially the Faust
character, who has a paper bag over his head. All the characters
attacks and special moves are animated perfectly, and look
superb. But some of the Overdrive Attacks (the equivalent of
Hyper Combos in Capcom fighting games) and new Instant Kills
(like the fatalities in Mortal Kombat, but can be done any time)
look just plain odd. Faust has the weirdest set of moves. Some of
his special moves worth mentioning are him hiding himself under a
rug and dropping down from above onto an opponent. Another
unrealistic one is him opening a door that appears out of nowhere
onto the opponent. Fausts Instant Kill attack is him
putting a foe on a canvas, and making the opponent explode with
TNT. The just mentioned attack is one of the stupidest moves to
put into a serious fighting game. And you must be thinking what
the people in charge were smoking when they added it in. But
either way, all the action going on screen never slows down
during game play. And one can wonder how the developers at Arc
System Work managed to keep the frame rate going so fast at a
consistent rate.

Sound

Theres a weird announcer who does a little opening spiel
for each round, and you can barely make out a word he says. He
has a deep, robot voice. And at times you cant determine
weather or not hes speaking English or Japanese. Just like
most other fighting games, each character has their set of taunts
and yell out the name of their moves as they do them. And as you
expect, its mostly in Japanese. The sound effects are dead on,
with all the punches, explosions, and so on sounding the way they
should.

Game play

As I have already told you, Guilty Gear X is a 2D fighter. And
it controls a lot like Street Fighter, but has enough unique
elements thrown in to be billed as having its own set of
controls. Just like any other fighting game, you can perform
special moves like projectile attacks, and so on by inputting a
specific button sequence. The game takes advantage of the analog
stick control, so its easier to pull off moves. This game
has special attacks that most other games dont feature. A
few of these are Roman Cancels, which allow you to link up
several combos at once. And Dust Attacks, which help you get past
opponents who like to hold their guard all the time. Street
Fighter has the popular, Hyper Combo Gauge, but in here,
its called the Tension Gauge. It can be built
up by sustaining damage and doing regular moves. The Tension
Gauge can be built up to three levels, and you can do various
special attacks (called Overdrive Attacks) at certain levels that
deal great damage. There is also a Instant Kill
attack. You do this by first holding down all four main action
buttons at once, and this is the time you are allotted to do the
Instant Kill attack (which is about 5 seconds). If you dont
do it within that time, you start to lose health. And if you
connect with it at just the right spot, then you will score an
instant win. But if you miss with this attack, then you
cant perform any more Overdrive Attacks or Instant Kills
for the rest of the round.

There are five main modes of play. The standard mode is the
Arcade mode. Where you work your way up the ladder through
computer opponents, and defeat the final Gear. The next mode of
play is Versus mode where you go against a friend. Training mode
is where you go against a computer dummy, so you can practice all
your moves, and see how zany all those Instant Kill attacks are.
Then, we have Survival mode, where you fight one computer
opponent after another with just one life bar. The last mode is
Recording where all you do is simply save replays of
your favorite battles so you can watch them at a later time.

Replay Value

The game does have a little extra here to keep you playing.
The Versus mode is nice, so you and your friend can go at it in
endless duels. I usually dont record battles too much in
fighting games, but at least the option is there. And the
training mode is welcomed so you can learn all your moves. And
Survival is definitely a nice extra feature for the solo player.
So we have a decent amount of extras to say the least.

This is a decent fighter all around. It is a welcomed
addition in the lacking 2D fighting games library for the PS2,
which is now just this game and Capcom vs. SNK 2. It has some
flaws, but is a good package all together. If youre a die
hard 2D fighter fan, than this one is definitely worth a look.